At a press conference on September 4th in Chicago ahead of the very first concert of Garth’s world tour and his official comeback from retirement, he announced that he was going digital, and doing so by launching his own digital company. As one of the last holdouts to the iTunes generation, Garth’s music couldn’t be found in either a downloadable or streamable form anywhere on the internet. The 3rd best selling artist in the history of music insisted that he did not want to piecemeal his material out in individual songs, but wanted to sell his music digitally as entire albums out of respect for the album concept. This insistence on special treatment compared to every other artist already dealing in digital is what made Garth unwilling to work with iTunes, Amazon, or anyone else.

Now that all changes. Garth has launched GhostTunes LLC, which allows the artist to select how their songs or albums are sold. Just like iTunes, artists can choose to allow consumers to buy individual songs if they want, or they can choose to only make their music available as cohesive albums. GhostTunes also touts the ability for artists to bundle music together in a manner not seen by major digital retailers, meaning if artist’s so choose, they can sell two albums, three albums, or their entire discography together at a discounted price. Maybe they take seven songs from seven different albums, and offer them as an EP. Offer a live DVD with two separate albums. They can also bundle digital albums with physical albums, or other merch like T-Shirts, stickers, etc.

For example, as a promotional deal from Garth Brooks and GhostTunes, Garth is making his entire career’s work available for one price. Eight studio albums, a double live album and DVD, and two new digital albums not even released yet are being made available to the public digitally for $29.99. Compared to the sticker price of 12 albums from comparative digital retailers, that is a steal. Of course, if you already have Garth’s CD’s, you’ve been able to burn them into iTunes or your digital music program for years. And since the music listening paradigm is already shifting dramatically away from downloads to digital streaming, at some point all downloads may lose their intrinsic value. Still, from the regularly dollar-driver Garth, this digital package seems like one hell of a deal.

Something else GhostTunes touts is the ability to purchase music, and listen to it immediately (meaning, without having to go through the time {or the data allowances} to download it), and it will immediately show up on your respective music devices in a derivative or hybrid of cloud technology. This makes GhostTunes sort of a cross between a download store like iTunes, and a streaming service like Spotify. Rights deals have already been signed, and GhostTunes already gives consumers access to millions of songs.

All of this sounds interesting, and GhostTunes is offering just enough wrinkles in their service to delineate themselves from the competition, including offering more flexibility to musicians which in turn might entice more hardcore fans and Audiofiles to the format, but is GhostTunes truly a game changer in digital music?

Releasing all of Garth’s music digitally is most definitely a game changer. As part of Garth’s announcement of going digital, GhostTunes erected the biggest virtual billboard any small-time technology company could ever imagine. The sheer volume of people coming to check the format out and pick up their Garth bundle is going to create the momentum to make GhostTunes a player in the digital music space if nothing else happens subsequently. But who is this all about? Is this about Garth Brooks the artist finally figuring out a way to release his music digitally, or is this about Garth Brooks the GhostTunes founder launching a forward-thinking digital music company that can make the rest of the industry offer more choices, and service artists better?

In GhostTunes’ infant stages, it’s hard to tell what effect it might have, but the inherent trouble for GhostTunes the company is that digital downloading is already next to antiquated. Garth has been retired so long, he missed the evolution of not one, but two music delivery mediums, and streaming is where everything seems to be headed. In the short term, with the slightly older demographic Garth appeals to, many of which are still trying to get used to iTunes, the GhostTunes format may still be appealing…for a while. But eventually GhostTunes would have to figure out how to compete in a non-download environment. Giving consumers the ability to listen to music right after purchase without downloading it is a start, but where does it go from there?

However, there may be the perfect little niche in the digital music marketplace for GhostTunes to thrive. As Saving Country Music has pointed out in the past, there exists a desire from both consumers and artists to create a more sustainable digital environment for music. You don’t have to go far to find story after story about how the payouts from streamers like Spotify and Pandora are abhorrently low, and do not create a sustainable environment for musicians. GhostTunes, with its cheaper, quasi-streaming ability could be a potential solution; if not in its current form, then in whatever form it may take in the future.

When you really look at it, GhostTunes is a “for the artists, by the artists” type of digital format. Though most artists and independent consumers may naturally see someone like Garth Brooks as the enemy, the idea he built GhostTunes around was to give artists more control—something that was lost in the advent of iTunes. GhostTunes still has to prove its relevancy in the marketplace to survive. But it might be a good start. GhostTunes might also challenge the bigger streaming companies like iTunes, Amazon, or even some of the streamers, to augment their formats—allowing artists to offer songs only in the album format, or bundled with physical merch. Some other formats like CD Baby and BandCamp already allow such bundling, but GhostTunes could take this practice mainstream.

Something else to consider is the future is not totally etched in stone for Spotify, Pandora, iHeartRadio, and other streamers. None of these companies have been able to show sufficient enough profit to convince the public of their long-term viability. iHeartRadio’s parent company Clear Channel is sitting under a mountain of debt and continues to turn in quarterly deficits. These streaming companies and subsidiaries are predicated on what they might do in the future, not the profits they are making now. And meanwhile Congress and many artist advocacy groups are looking into trying to increase payouts companies like Pandora music give to artists and songwriters, which could eventually disrupt their streaming model and put them out-of-business, or limit their growth.

In the end, there’s a good chance GhostTunes will be small, and remain small. And it seems like Garth Brooks would be just fine with that. In the press conference Garth said, “What we’re trying to show the rest of the industry is that you can do this for any artist and we want you to do this for any artist. It’s a beautiful format that is young, it’s flexible, it’s small. I want to stay small because I don’t want corporate wagging the tail of the dog.” But its effect on how we all consume music may be much greater depending how the digital music wind blows in the coming years.

Like you said, downloads are basically history (unfortunately for MY bank account). So he’s really just opening up a new outdated store to go with the other outdated stores so that he can release his music digitally while pretending he stuck to his guns somehow.

If he wants to invent something – he should invent a new format that puts money back in the artist’s pockets. Maybe invent a great PR spin that gets people to quit streaming and go back to buying 8-tracks or something.

Agree! He missed the boat and this is not a game changer. If he wanted to enter as a game changer, help eliminate the greedy outdated record companies. Make the music prices a win for the artist and the fans.

I predicted in a comment on this site back in the winter that Garth Brooks was going to create his own competitor to iTunes. I’m not going to say “I told you so” but I do expect a friendly pat on the back from everybody that frequents this site.

Insignificant as the terming may be, are we talking in terms of sales in the U.S. or worldwide? Garth’s only 14th worldwide, but 3rd in the U.S.

As for the actual topic at hand, this is interesting. It seems as though Garth, regardless of the merits of the bundle, is trying to push consumers into buying his whole discography. If you look at the individual albums options, each is $12.99 on its own, CD or digital. That’s EXTREMELY steep for individual albums, given that the norm for iTunes and Amazon is about $9.99 depending on the release. Add that to the fact that pretty much all of Garth’s CDs can be obtained for pennies on the dollar at your average used record store like Hastings, it seems a bit odd. It think this is Garth’s ego speaking out, given that sales of his whole discography will add to his record total.

As for the new releases, apparently his 1998 album Double Live is getting a “25th Anniversary” re-release for whatever reason and his site claims that TWO new Garth albums are in the pipeline for release. It might very well be a double album as Garth had stated but it’s beginning to sound like they’ll be released separately a la Guns N’ Roses’ Use Your Illusion I and II. I’m interested to hear more details and see the press release next week about the first day sales.

I’m confused (and I’ve seen it stated on other sites as well). The year 2023 will mark 25th Anniversary of Garth’s Double Live album – it was released in 1998. So, he wants you to prepay for an album as part of a bundle package that you won’t be available for 9 years?

I thought Napster and “file sharing” was supposed to have killed music years ago. Remember that whole shit storm with Metallica crying on their pile of millions while Bono said, “Eh, I’ve got my millions what do I care?”

The irony is now it turns out teens are too lazy to download and organize files illegally so they use YouTube and Pandora. Teens have told me as much. BTW Pandora doesn’t have a whole lot of songs, I mean if you are really into say CCR, or Queen, or Tammy Wynette, or Rose Maddox… the selection is rather pitiful. So I guess people are just THAT LAZY that they’ll listen to the same 5 songs by an artist because pressing play or inserting a a CD is for suckers.

I’m no Audiophile but I do like to listen to an ALBUM quite often, from start to finish the whole story. So I if this brings ANY focus back to albums as an art form, then I’m all for it. In fact I think streaming could actually create an environment where those artists who still produce physical music or want start making extremely great and innovative stuff because they know it has to be good if they want it to sell. Anyone can make a Pandora ready pop song.

Of course I still believe if free music didn’t kill the music business with Napster and it’s offspring, just like cassettes didn’t then I don’t think streaming will. Of course I am in NO WAY saying the quality may not nose dive faster than John Denver’s plane on empty.

Metallica’s argument, which time has shown was the correct argument all along, was never about any supposed hit to their income. They said as much in 2001. It was always about control. The financial impact, as they said, wouldn’t be felt by them but by new acts who needed to immediately be successful so they wouldn’t be dropped by their label. That is exactly what happened, as the industry has cratered.

Haven’t seen anyone label it as “revolutionizing” though I haven’t seen every bit of coverage about it. It does offer capabilities to artists and fans Amazon doesn’t have, especailly in the bundling features, but as outlined in this article, its dependence on purchase instead of subscription could limit its reach. Even Garth Brooks is calling it “small.”

I still don’t really see the advantage to the customer. Aside from a good deal on Garth Brooks digital, why would someone buy from this service as opposed to the numerous options that already exist with major market traction?

I’ll almost guarantee that even if the “bundling” of digitals turns into an advantage, the concept will become a part of iTunes within a year.

Unless there is some secret sauce that hasn’t yet been reported, GhostTunes is DOA.

But all GhostTunes was set up to do at its core was to offer a digital outlet for Garth’s music. He seemed to say, “Well if I’m going to do it for myself, why not make it available to other artists?” I don’t think anyone thinks it will compete with Spotify, or even iTunes. But having said that, never say never. If they make the right evolutionary moves, and the enviroment for streamers becomes prohibitive, which very well may happen, then who knows? Garth himself has said its supposed to be small, so let’s not assign some big ambition to GhostTunes that it doesn’t even have for itself. If it provides Garth’s music with a fairly successful digital outlet, it has done its job.

I like the concept. Now, if Ghosttunes will allow artists to offer different (particularly lossless) formats such as 16 and 24 bit FLAC, it will really have my attention as I won’t buy lossy MP3s. Plus, that will also make it one of the few competitors in the audiophile market. A small niche, but one completely neglected by most other streaming services and download retailers.

The difference here is scale and ambition. Neil Young is wanting to compete with iTunes in a market that is already dying. Garth is simply trying to give his music a digital outlet, and provide the same outlet to other artists along the way if they want to participate. In the end though, both may be short-sighted, and fail.

That Pono thing is a joke – and definitely proof that people will eat up every crumb of shit a celebrity feeds them. Even friends of mine, who I otherwise consider to be intelligent human beings, are fawning all over this thing just because their favorite celeb tells them too.

As far as GhostTunes goes. I think the idea is great to just sell your own shit the way you want to sell it. But, he could have just done that on his own website. Wouldn’t get as much publicity that way of course.

There’s so many places like that now, it’ll more than likely just be one more invisible place that CD Baby sticks my music when I release an album. I get my little $5-$20 deposits from HUNDREDS of places just like this. Most of them I’ve never even heard of.

I think the biggest challenge this is going to face is that most of the albums are listed at about $3 more than iTunes and Amazon. The hardcore fan may be willing to pay a little more knowing that the artist will get a bigger piece than they do with the others, but the casual fan almost certainly won’t.

Despite the financial difficulties being faced by many of the large streaming companies, the biggest streaming company of all is doing very well: Google (which owns Youtube). In my experience, I have found that almost all of the songs that I want to hear can be found on Youtube (one important exception to this pattern is Garth Brooks songs, due to the threats by his aggressive legal team).

However, there are some important advantages to the download format, despite the cost. One of them is in being able to listen to your favorite songs in a place where Internet service is slow, sporadic, or nonexistent (*cough* India *cough*). Another advantage is that it allows you to create your own personalized CDs that you can listen to on car trips, for example.

One more comment on albums vs individual songs. In all my time in downloading music, I have never purchased a full album. I only purchase music that I truly love, and I cannot think of an album in which I love every song. For example, I do not want to buy Taylor Swift’s entire album Red and pay money to Max Martin and Shellback for their crap songs just so that I can get “Sad Beautiful Tragic”, “All Too Well”, or “Treacherous”. If an artist tries to force the consumer to buy an entire album just to listen to one song, then the artist will inevitably and deservedly face lower than expected sales.

I think Garth is perfectly willing to deal with lower sales to keep his album concept in tact, though as some have pointed out, he’s already made two individual singles from his new album available. The other way to look at it is by only making songs available on albums, you entice more people to purchase albums, making up for any lost sales. With offering his entire discography for thirty bucks, I think Garth is signaling it’s not about the money, it’s about the principal. This was the same signal he gave in Ireland. Garth’s sitting on a war chest. He’s concerned much more now about building his legacy, and in the way he wants.

Wow. Just the opposite of me: I have never purchased a single and won’t. For example, I couldn’t imagine buying Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On (single) and missing the whole concept of the returning Vietnam vet’s homecoming as articulated in the rest of side 1. Granted, I’m much older than you and grew up with albums.
Maybe a recent example: heard I’ve Got A Car on the radio and it never occurred to me to buy the single instead of George’s whole album.
And for the record (ha!), the first piece of music I recall in the house as a kid was a 45 RPM of Bye Bye Love!

I think it should come down to preference, I for one am older, but I still like the option of buying a particular song I like, as opposed to a whole album – Example, I like “Bang Bang” by Ariana Grande, Jesse J and Nicki Minaj, but I don’t necessarily want their whole albums. On the flip side though albums like The Who’s Tommy and Pink Floyd’s The Wall re best heard in their entirety. But I tend to like to actually possess physical copies of those albums and older bands I grew up listening to. But I still have 8-tracks, cassettes, records and CDs so what do I know, LOL

I agree with that, Trigger. Also, the single is a pre-order for the new cd, with the other single thrown in as a thank you when purchasing the bundle. You can’t actually buy just the singles either on his site or GhostTunes. And apparently his site is working better than the GT site.

Funny, earlier today the two songs “People Loving People” and “Send Em on Down the Road” where available for 99 cents, now you can only get them when you preorder the album. I like buying full albums better, but funny how it changed.

I agree the ghost tunes site is a bit draggy and seems to be having some hiccups in moving from one area to another. Maybe its just over loaded with hits right now.

I did not see any Garth singles for sale. I guess he is only going to sell full albums or the “bundle”. Well Garth what if some of us don’t want full albums, we would like to pick the songs we want. I really like several of his songs but I don’t love all of them. I am with another person above who said they always buy singles and have never bought a album. To bad I was all set to go get a few of his songs I had wanted but could never get off Itunes…

Not everyone will have the dollars to purchase his bundle and albums. So guess unless you are willing to spend his amount and buy even what you don’t want, your just out of luck. Seems a bit greedy to me and not very fan appreciative.

My thinking is those that buy singles, only the songs they love, will continue to do so and will pass on his “bundle” an album offerings … feeling just as strongly about not being made to spend more than they want or buy what they don’t want…just as he feels strongly apparently that people should buy a whole album of his even if they don’t want it.

Not sure that I agree with the demise of downloads. Some of us still like to own our music, digital, or physical. I think depending on an internet connection is silly. Technology fails occasionally. Streaming quality is generally crap and only good when you need some background noise. I’ve actually started going back and repurchasing CD’s of my favorite albums that I have downloaded over the past decade.

Do not purchase from this website unless you plan to listen to your purchase on your computer or burn it to a cd. They do not have a mobile app and the website streaming does not work on phones. This is a very 1990’s site that does not work and is rip off!

I think it’s been successful for Garth, but I don’t think it’s had any material influence in the marketplace at large. It’s hard to know because the reporting on Ghosttunes sales is a little bit foggy.